Rounds
by b e f r e e
Summary: Ron and Hermione are beginning to speak to each other again after the Lavender Brown fiasco. Oneshot. Het. RxH.


**A/N: **I wrote this quite some time ago and have had it sitting dusty in my computer files. I guess it's time to start sharing. I always thought that Harry must not know every little detail that goes on with Ron and Hermione's relationship while he's preoccupied during their sixth year and what a shame it is that the reader never gets to see the little things going on behind the scenes. Never mind that the climactic kiss in the middle of the Battle of Hogwarts seems to be their first, if Ron's shock is anything to go by. This is just my imagination putting in extras. Enjoy! Oneshot. Het. RxH.

**Disclaimer: **I do not own Harry Potter or anything else you recognize, obviously.

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Rounds

"Hermione?"

Her footsteps slowed, and she stopped at a 'T' in the corridor, looking around with her wand clutched tightly in her fist. She was always on edge doing rounds so late at night.

"Right here," Ron's voice came from much closer on her right than she'd expected.

"Oh, it's you," she relaxed her grip on her wand and fell into step with him the way she'd been going. "How far along are you for the night?" she asked, after a moment of near silence.

"I'm almost done. I got an early start after Quidditch practice. I can help you finish, if you'd like though."

"That's okay," she declined quietly. "Thanks though. I know you need to get back and shower."

Ron shrugged. "I've been muddy and gross for a few hours already, what's a few more minutes going to hurt?"

Hermione smiled and turned down a flight of stairs. They walked in almost silence, but that wasn't unusual for Ron and Hermione. They usually only bickered or said nothing, and things between them had been tense lately, to say the least. Lavender and Ron had officially broken up and rumor was that Ron had been sleeping with Hermione for years now.

"_The funny thing is that they think you were even speaking to one another much less doing anything else,"_ Harry had told her the day before. "_And really, you're smarter than to sleep with Ron when he's treating you so badly."_

"_Are you saying you think I would have if he had been decent to me?"_

Harry had just laughed and threw up a shield charm against the light hex Hermione had thrown his way. Hermione had just been glad that he'd been laughing. Lately, Harry had been miserable to be around.

"What?" Ron was looking at her with a strange expression on his face, and Hermione realized that she had sighed, and probably had quite the strange expression across her own face.

"Oh," she flushed, "I'm just worried..."

"About Harry?" Ron sighed and they rounded the last corridor leading to the Gryffindor common room. "Me too. He's obsessed with Malfoy and that bloody book. Dirigible Plum."

"Right you are," the Fat Lady said, swinging open to let them into the common room.

"See you at breakfast?" Ron gave her a half-smile apologetically. "I'm whooped."

"I'll save some bacon."

"Thanks, Hermione," he smiled a little brighter and disappeared up the stairs to the dormitory. Hermione sank into a familiar cushion in front of the low fire and started to pull out a book. When she opened it, however, she didn't read very far. A few paragraphs in she had completely abandoned the reading in favor of mulling over her own thoughts.

"Someone on your mind?"

"Hmm?" Hermione blinked a few times and looked up at Harry, who was in his pajamas beside the couch she was leaning against. "Sorry, what did you say?"

"Something on your mind?" Harry altered.

"Oh, no. I'm just getting tired is all."

He frowned a little, but didn't say anything until a few minutes after he'd sat down.

"What?" Hermione asked. He clearly wanted to say something.

"Ah, I just wondered if you two had talked or something."

Hermione didn't even bother asking who. "Well, we said a few words. Pleasantries, that's all. Why?"

"He came up grinning like a bloody baboon." Harry gave a small smirk but hesitated before he continued, "You'd almost think he might have come to his senses and made a move he was so happy. Haven't made those rumors true yet, though, have you." He didn't make it a question because they both knew that wasn't true, but Hermione's face burned anyway. "Look," Harry sighed. "I'm not going to say that Ron did the right thing with that whole Lavender business. I don't think he ever loved her, hardly even liked her for most of it, but I also know he didn't want to hurt anyone. Her _or_ you. He got overwhelmed with the thought of being desirable. Ron…well, he doesn't think the most of himself, does he? When a girl like her shoves her chest in front of a guy like him...he didn't think straight for a couple months…"

"Harry, I _know_. I get why."

"I know, but erm-I didn't put this the way I wanted to say it, I think," Harry sighed and tried to collect his thoughts. "If Ron didn't have his head stuck up his ass the whole time he's fancied you, he might have figured out that you might fancy him too, you know? He's never sure of anything so you just have to make it really, _really_ obvious. Maybe not in the same way Lavender tried to, 'cause you're not that kind of girl."

"You're rambling," Hermione interjected.

Harry tried to collect himself again. "Right now, he's not sure if he will ever be able to make it up to you and fix things. He's almost completely decided that you'll never forgive him enough to be anything but friends. Assuming that I'm not as daft as he is an that you _are _willing to work things out, you just…need to let him know, alright?" Harry clapped her on the shoulder like a brother as he stood back up.

"Idiots, all of you," Hermione shook her head.

"Yeah," He laughed a little. "I guess we are. Goodnight, Hermione."

"Goodnight. Don't stay up all night spying on Malfoy," she added for good measure, but he just waved a hand as he rounded up the spiral staircase.

"You're not still up, are you?"

Hermione blinked. It was darker than she remembered, and there was a book page stuck to the side of her face, the rest of the book laying across her chest.

"Ron?"

His face materialized dimly and after a quiet _incendio_, the fire that had been dying on the hearth lept back to life to reveal a gentle smile.

"Yeah," he almost whispered. Hermione blinked groggily again and pushed herself up on her elbows. She'd fallen asleep in the common room again. Two nights ago, when Harry had had his little talk with her, she'd woken up in the same spot.

"What time is it?"

"Almost four."

"Merlin," she groaned. "What are you doing up?"

"I thought I'd go the kitchens and get a bite to eat," he grinned, and hesitated before adding. "Wanna come?"

"Yeah," she took his hand and let him help her up. It took her a moment to get her bearings in her sleepy state, but when she did she realized that Ron hadn't moved.

"What?"

He stared at her a second, then reached a gangly arm down and tugged on the bottom of her skirt, which had ridden up while she was sleeping.

"Thanks…"

He just nodded silently, and they made their way to the kitchens in similar quiet. It was comfortable, unlike the awkward silences that filled their mealtimes and study sessions lately during the day. At night, it was different.

They got a couple of cold sandwiches from the elves and Hermione pulled Ron into one of the unused rooms near the kitchens to eat them. A few dusty tables were shoved on the back wall by the window, which Hermione cleaned off with a quick _Scourgiffy_ before plopping up onto and setting the plate of sandwiches down. She had settled herself, one leg up with her knee to her chest while the other hung down, and had lifted the sandwich halfway to her mouth before she realized that Ron hadn't moved to eat yet, which wasn't right. Ron was _always _quick to grab a bite. Instead he was staring at her, mouth open slightly and a dazed look in his eyes that was certainly not hunger, at least of the sort they had set out to satisfy in the kitchens.

"Ron," she didn't dare speak above a whisper. She dropped the sandwich back to the plate.

"Hermione," he whispered back. She watched him lick his lips. Out of nerves or hunger she wasn't certain. He stepped forward, close enough to the table for her to smell the fresh scent of his shampoo and the mint of the toothpaste he'd used before bed. "Hermione," he repeated, licking his lips again. "I-I'm…I'm sorry." He didn't have to say what for. She opened her mouth to stop him, but he took her hands before she could speak. "Don't say 'It's alright' or anything, please. Because it isn't alright. I haven't been manning up lately. I don't know that I can ever make things right between us, but I'll do anything for you." He didn't make the statement sound desperate or cheesy. He didn't beg, he just stated it as the fact it was. "Tell me, and I'll do it. I miss you. I didn't think I'd ever be able to even talk to you again, much less touch you. I miss all the silly bickering and nagging and being bossed around. So please, just tell me what to do."

Hermione could barely breathe because during that talk, he had lifted a calloused hand to her cheek? "Kiss me." Had he not been close enough to do so he wouldn't have been close enough to even hear her say it, but he didn't hesitate to comply. He kissed her, not like a hungry man desperate to devour every crumb put in front of him, but like a starved man brought to tears as he savored her sweet flavor slowly.

She reveled in it. No Yule Ball fumbles, dormitory gossip, or her mother's trashy romance novels had prepared her for this. It wasn't graceful and suave like in the books and that fact made it even more exhilarating. Her infamously sharp mind was blunted and instead her body lead her on by instinct, running a rogue hand through the hair at the nape of his neck and opening her body up to let him closer.

She was moving without thinking, without calculating consequences and analyzing emotions. She breathed shakily through her nose and let herself indulge in the freedom and levity of the moment; a snog in an empty classroom like any other normal teenage student had experienced years ago. Only they weren't normal, were they?

"Hermione," Ron pulled away just enough to breathe, foreheads touching and his chest rising and falling rapidly against her own. Neither moved for a long moment, but Ron finally pecked her on the lips, and stepped away.

"Come on," he held a hand out to her and helped her off the table. For the second time that night he tugged the hem of her skirt down and this time, Hermione didn't blush. "Let's get back, it's getting late."

Hermione just nodded and they rejoined their hands again. It was a short, quiet walk back to the tower and as they approached the portrait hole, Hermione watched it open, seemingly of it's own accord.

"Finally?" came Harry's disembodied voice. His footsteps moved past them and their heads followed his sound. "The dormitory is all pretty sound asleep," he mentioned lightly. "I won't be back until late."

"Wanker. Don't you have better things to do than spy on Malfoy?" Ron leaned on the portrait as Hermione rolled her eyes and crawled through.

"Can't think of any. Goodnight," Harry's voice moved farther down the hall.

"Bloody obsessed," Ron muttered. "Next you know those two will be getting together."

Hermione arched an eyebrow. "That's not funny, Ron."

He paled a little, then slowly shook his head. "No...I guess it isn't." He laughed anyways.


End file.
